Welding Tips and Tricks

mcoe wrote:This is just theoretical but if I were to open a welding shop doing repair work, call out work, and just general welding, what certification would be the best to have for that line of work? This is assuming that people will feel better if you were certified and want to know which credentials you have. Would a welding inspector certification be the best?

mcoe,
First, this has been a debated subject for years and you will and did get different answers. This is my opinion.
You can in fact start a welding business with out a "cert". However I would not recommend it for several reasons. First from the liability stand point. Most big business' will not want to have you welding on their parts or in their facilities without first showing that you are certified to do it. Second, again in my opinion, why would you want to start a professional welding business and not have your certs? Looks unprofessional and will discredit you to other businesses. This is not saying that you can't run the business without them. As AKweldshop said, your reputation will proceed you, good or bad. Third, most work you will bid on will require proof of a certain certification or you will have to get it before the work is performed. This may or may not apply to you in some cases.
Now as far as which certifications would be best remember that your walk-ins or farmers will just be impressed and at ease just knowing that you are "certified" and generally won't care or know which cert it is. Depending on what work you will go after, I would go after a D1.1 in both stick and mig. After that, it will depend on what you want to get into.
I am going for my CWI in June. One of the main reasons I am getting it is company bragging rights (being honest here) and the ability to offer a CWI service to others. I can't check my own work, as Otto said, but I can check my employees and I can assure customers of quality. For the cost, a CWI may not help you at all, unless you offer your services privately to others. Also, Wes917 is absolutely correct, holding a CWI cert does not necessarily show the customer you can weld, just that you can inspect for quality and can look up codes etc. I have heard of quite a few newbies going right for their CWI with little to no experience. They cant really weld but they have a cert.
Anyway this is just my opinion.
-Jonathan

Superior,

Are you doing the prep course and test at Lincoln? I will be going for mine but not until the next offering next year. I just accepted a new position at work and going to be working with the engineers on maintaining weld records, writing/modifying eps etc and think that the cwi would be good to have. I've kinda been putting it off bc the books are so expensive to get to start studying before the seminar. I think I'm going to sign up for the online prep/ along with the two week course.

Question: If you run your own business and you have an AWS D1.1 certification, how do you maintain that certification? The form and fee have to be sent in every 6 months and you cannot sign off on your own certification.

lazerbeam wrote:Question: If you run your own business and you have an AWS D1.1 certification, how do you maintain that certification? The form and fee have to be sent in every 6 months and you cannot sign off on your own certification.

No but my wife can, she is the CFO.
-Jonathan

Thanks for all the input. My plan is to one day have my own shop to do walk in repair work and call out work. I was not too concerned about doing bid work because I have this metal art and horseshoe art business that keeps me pretty busy. I like John's idea of letting my work speak for itself but just wanted an idea of a general certification for work like this.

Where I'm at you don't really need certs for what your talking about (repair work or light fab work). Just a business license and if you do bid work, a contractors license(and bond, and insurance). Usually the Customer is the one that demands the certification, not the authority having jurisdiction. That being said, I think the more certs you have the better off you'll be...customers who don't know any better eat that stuff up.

Thats why you see so many small repair shops with names like "Certified Welding" or something like that. Just sounds better than "Joe's welding shack".

Welding inspecters are the same as any other inspecter. You take a class and get a piece of paper and boom your the inspecter. Kinda a joke if you ask me. Most welders probably aren't doing anything that NEEDS to be inspected anyway. Your not gonna pay hundreds of dollars for an x-ray or ultrasound of that weld joint on a trailer hitch.

Anyway, you need to look into your own local regulations and laws, because everything is differant in every county and state(and country).

Just keep liability in mind with whatever you are building or repairing. Stuff going over the road has a certain, built in liability. It is kind of like kids throwing rocks, it is all good until someone starts bleeding.

This is true. However even if you are certified and they find a defective weld, that cert ain't necessarily going to protect you. The best defense against a lawsuit like that is to be sure you do quality work and turn out a quality product. And even then you'll inevitably get some jerk trying to sue you. Just cause you have money and he doesn't.